


Letter to Carrie

by ScarletteStar1



Category: Homeland
Genre: Angst, F/M, Friendship, Hurt, Letter, Longing, Love, Older Man/Younger Woman, Post season three, prior to season four
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-14
Updated: 2019-09-14
Packaged: 2020-10-17 08:16:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20617859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScarletteStar1/pseuds/ScarletteStar1
Summary: As part of his personal penance, Saul writes to Carrie. . .





	Letter to Carrie

Dearest Demeter,

In all the years we've known each other, I don't think I've ever written you a letter. Come to think of it, I'm not sure I've even written you a birthday card. I know there was a card that went out to you with the gift for the baby, (who by my feeble accounts should be arriving any day now?) but to be totally honest with you, Mira bought the gift and wrote the card.

We spies don't like to write things down, do we? There's something terribly unforgiving and terrifying about leaving a written record of our thoughts, words, and deeds, isn't there?

Anyway, I'm writing you now. In fact, I write you all the time, although I always use our code names. I can see your eyes roll at this little nugget into my psyche; don't let it go to your head. Fuck me, I confide it all in you now. I've always confided it all in you.

My therapist suggested journaling might be good for my soul. Oh, yes, as part of our reconciliation, Mira and I saw a couple's therapist and she suggested I get more in touch with my feelings by writing in a journal. Now, I'm certain you are rolling your eyes and laughing at me. Go ahead. Get it out of your system. Believe it or not, I do it. Whether or not it has shed any light on this black heart of mine, I don't have a fucking clue, but I do it, every day. It thrills Mira to know I'm taking my internal work so seriously. She grants me space and privacy to write, which I sometimes do for hours on end. 

Most days, I find myself writing to you.

Once when she heard me on the phone with you, Mira observed the tone of my voice changes when I speak to you. Or, spoke to you, as the case may be now. She said I never sounds like that with anyone else. I wasn't sure what she meant at the time, but I know now. Writing has illuminated for me how you occupy different space within me. It's a difficult thing to explain, so I write. I write and I write all the stupid and foolish things I'd like to say to you.

And then I tear the pages out of the notebook and burn them. Once a spy always a spy.

So you may never know it, but now I've written you letters. Dozens of them.

I left you a couple messages, dunno if you got them or not, or if you even use the same number. While I didn't expect you to call back, I have to say I hoped against hope that you would. I miss you more than I ever knew was possible. That's a stupid thing for an old man who's just about seen it all to say, but there you have it. Many of the pages of this fucking notebook have been scribbled over with litanies of the simple things I miss about you. Your smile. Your passion. Your rage. I never thought I'd long for a woman badgering, second guessing, scolding, and scamming me. Doesn't that beat all?

I'd like to try and explain about the vacancy, the hole I have in me now. It's like this aching wound that will not heal. There are times I imagine people could see straight through the gaping hole, but that might just be an old spy's paranoia. 

Other days, I write how sorry I am.

We are in Greece now, Mira and me. Did you know? We rented this amazing apartment (where by the way you'd be more than welcome to come and visit if you wanted. Plenty of room! Mira would be elated to see you.) and the sea is just a short walk away.

One afternoon, I took my paper and pen down to the ocean and just wrote "I'm so sorry" over and over. I must have written it a few hundred times, like a schoolboy being punished, until the sun was low in the sky. I took the pages down to the water's edge and dipped them in until the ink blurred. Then I crumpled it up into a small wet ball and put it in my pocket. When I took off my pants that night, I forgot it was in them, and Mira washed them. They emerged from the wash and dry in this hard, little mummified talisman of my despair. I didn't throw it away. I didn't burn it. I took it and put it in a box lined with velvet where I keep a bunch of other trinkets of my past. 

How much power did we think we had? Moving our pieces over the international chess board? How much pride did we take in all our plays? In the paper, I read about the nuclear treaty, and I thought maybe it was worth it. But thinking and feeling are different things, aren't they? I just cannot bring myself to feel the worthiness some days when I hear your voice and see your face as they are tattooed on my memory. 

Maybe it'll never matter to you how sorry I am. Hell, it doesn't change a damn thing, but I've got to tell you, my rotten shell of a soul ached for you when I heard about Brody. I was also pissed as holy hell at the ethics of the thing. He was our asset and we'd promised him safe passage. It used to mean something in our business. We did him dirty. You and him both got a raw fucking deal, and I was honestly powerless to effect any change on the situation at that point. I've got to live with that for the rest of my life. I know it isn't like what you have to live with, is it? But we have to find a way. Both of us do. 

I've never quite stopped wanting to hold you. The water here is so warm and salty it's like walking into a mother's embrace. Somedays, I wade into the sea and float on the current of waves and I imagine it's you and me, holding onto one another in an infinite, fluid grasp. When I cry, my tears blend with the larger body of water and I feel like I might be a part of something bigger. They are stubborn, these feelings. I don't know what I'd even name them, but the opposite of them would be indifference or numbness and that's no way to live. So I feel. I float in the sea and feel the guilt and regret try to pull me out with the strength of their current. 

I couldn't blame you if you never spoke to me again, but if there were a god, I'd pray to him for it. Maybe this is the letter I won't burn. Maybe this is the one I'll send, and know in my heart you'll know what to do with it after you read it and consecrate it with fire yourself. 

Yours forever. And always,

Zeus.


End file.
